After years of bureaucratic obstruction, survivors of the wartime Arctic convoys – and there are not many left – have finally got the recognition they deserved – their own medal, the Arctic Convoy Star. More than 3,000 seamen were killed delivering fuel, food and munitions to Russia. Of the more than 65,000 who sailed on the convoys, only a few hundred remain alive. Like the RAF bomber crews, whose few remaining survivors will receive a special clasp for their existing medal (something crews of Fighter Command always have), it was as if they were somehow tainted through guilt by association – the RAF crews because of the firebombing of German cities, the convoy crews because the Soviet Union turned from ally to cold war enemy. Arctic convoy veterans said they felt awkward campaigning for a medal for that reason. But they risked their lives, in atrocious conditions, on what Churchill called the worst journey in the world.